Spiritual resource to share: church service
From time to time I volunteer to help with a conference call testimony meeting, in which people from all over the United States, and others from various parts of the world, can call up and have a virtual church experience! Here we have a brief sermon based on a topic chosen by the Reader. (In this case, I have chosen the topic of the divine economy, using the 23rd Psalm as the centerpiece of the readings from the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy.)
You can get more information by going to this site: http://www.csinteractivechurch.org/service-wed.html. You can also listen to the service on csdirectory's audio archive at http://www.csinteractivechurch.org/wed-audio-archive.html.
Here are the citations I used for the service:
Section 1 - no lack
Ps. 23:1
Phil. 4:19
John 6:5-14
SH 206:15
494: 10-15
SH 60:29
Section 2 - restoration
Ps 23: 2,3
Ps. 1:1-6
Job 33:4
Eph. 5:14
SH 593:9
518: 13
162: 4-28
423:8-26
Section 3: no evil
Ps 23: 4, 5 (to :)
Ps 139: 1-18
596: 20-27
151:18
228:20
SH 103:20-23 (to .)
327:17
Section 4: our permanent home
Ps 23: 5 , 6
Luke 12:32
Ps. 90:1
John 14:2, 12
Rom. 8:28
Acts 17:28
SH 254:31
SH 58:21
15: 25-30
3: 4-26
SH 261:4
578: 4-18
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
The loveliness of "Let" - revisited
spiritual resource to share: yielding
I was reading Science and Health this morning and came across this quote,
"Let" is such a welcoming word. It can mean to actively cause to happen, consent to and leave unchanged. Pretty broad definition. Other favorite "lets":
Years ago, I had a major let experience that showed me how freeing it is to "let go and let God."
I had been traveling in Central America and was supposed to meet my boyfriend at the very beginning of my trip. So many goof-ups and missed communications happened that after almost a month, we still hadn't connected and I was getting anxious and frustrated.
Finally, I was settled in one location and planned to be there for a long time, living with a local family. Plans (again) were made to meet him at the bus station at a certain time. The bus came and he wasn't on it. That's when I lost it. Storming home in a cloud of anger and frustration, I couldn't even think clearly until I got into my room. There I pulled out my Bible, my Science and Health, my book of poems and starting diving into them as a way to calm down.
I don't quite remember what I read, but I do recall a strong thought coming to me saying "If it isn't God's will, you don't want it to happen." Well, of course! I reasoned, if it isn't God's plan that we are to meet, then there is nothing I can do to make it happen. And if it is God's will, then there is nothing I can do to prevent it from happening. I had to let go of all my plans and hopes and really put it in God's hands ( where it already was any how). I had given my consent to the fixed principle that God governs every aspect of my life. What a relief!
The next morning, I had no expectation other than God was directing me in the way most needed and I felt at such peace with that. I took my books to the central park of that city, and started to read my Bible lesson in the warm sun and bustling market. It was God's day and I was happy.
It wasn't long afterwards that I looked up and saw a bus. Strange, I thought, buses aren't supposed to be running at this time. But there, getting off the bus was my friend and his friend!
We were so happy to have finally connected. He and his friend got settled in a youth hostel, and we were able to have a wonderful time together.
But most wonderful was this important lesson about let. Our active yielding to God brings peace and we see how God's plan for us unfolds - in a much better way than we could ever plan. How lovely!
Please add your own comments or email this article to a friend.
"Let unselfishness, goodness, mercy, justice, health, holiness, love - the kingdom of heaven - reign within us, and sin, disease, and death will diminish until they finally disappear."It was the "Let" that got me.
"Let" is such a welcoming word. It can mean to actively cause to happen, consent to and leave unchanged. Pretty broad definition. Other favorite "lets":
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.Letting is a yielding to a fixed principle of Love - consenting to that which is unchanged.
Let there be light.
Let our ordered lives confess the beauty of Thy peace.
Years ago, I had a major let experience that showed me how freeing it is to "let go and let God."
I had been traveling in Central America and was supposed to meet my boyfriend at the very beginning of my trip. So many goof-ups and missed communications happened that after almost a month, we still hadn't connected and I was getting anxious and frustrated.
Finally, I was settled in one location and planned to be there for a long time, living with a local family. Plans (again) were made to meet him at the bus station at a certain time. The bus came and he wasn't on it. That's when I lost it. Storming home in a cloud of anger and frustration, I couldn't even think clearly until I got into my room. There I pulled out my Bible, my Science and Health, my book of poems and starting diving into them as a way to calm down.
I don't quite remember what I read, but I do recall a strong thought coming to me saying "If it isn't God's will, you don't want it to happen." Well, of course! I reasoned, if it isn't God's plan that we are to meet, then there is nothing I can do to make it happen. And if it is God's will, then there is nothing I can do to prevent it from happening. I had to let go of all my plans and hopes and really put it in God's hands ( where it already was any how). I had given my consent to the fixed principle that God governs every aspect of my life. What a relief!
The next morning, I had no expectation other than God was directing me in the way most needed and I felt at such peace with that. I took my books to the central park of that city, and started to read my Bible lesson in the warm sun and bustling market. It was God's day and I was happy.
It wasn't long afterwards that I looked up and saw a bus. Strange, I thought, buses aren't supposed to be running at this time. But there, getting off the bus was my friend and his friend!
We were so happy to have finally connected. He and his friend got settled in a youth hostel, and we were able to have a wonderful time together.
But most wonderful was this important lesson about let. Our active yielding to God brings peace and we see how God's plan for us unfolds - in a much better way than we could ever plan. How lovely!
Please add your own comments or email this article to a friend.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Comment on posting of "Low, sad and sweet...."
Spiritual resource to share: others' comments
Thank you for this Kim. Healings that need to come through tenderness are so profound and complete. Denying our emotions (or mixed emotions) and forcing change can be so jarring, but to let go of the sad feelings of saying goodbye, because we are ready to say goodbye, is so peaceful and affirms the value of that which we let go of!
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
I so appreciated this comment on the posting earlier this week "Low, sad and sweet..." I wanted to share it with you all.
Thank you for this Kim. Healings that need to come through tenderness are so profound and complete. Denying our emotions (or mixed emotions) and forcing change can be so jarring, but to let go of the sad feelings of saying goodbye, because we are ready to say goodbye, is so peaceful and affirms the value of that which we let go of!
There was an instrument especially popular with the American transcendentalists, I don't know what it was called, kind of a dulcimer, or box with strings across it. They would put it in the window and the wind blowing gently over it would produce a gentle sound, perhaps harmonics are in play - but the sounds were random and very bittersweet- like major and minor mixed together. I have heard one and it is intriguing. Perhaps this was the object that inspired MBEddy's use of metaphor here.
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
Monday, May 11, 2009
"Low, sad and sweet....."
Spiritual resource to share: quietness and peace
In most major events, we say good bye and say hello almost in the same breath. Parting may be such sweet sorrow, but in that parting, there is a ripening of the human spirit.
When facing a major change in my life or my family's life, I have learned the wisdom of giving myself some quiet space to say goodbye. It gives me time to reflect and consider lessons learned. It gives me time to feel the gratitude for the experiences and people that make up my life experience.
"Low, sad and sweet" sums up the tone of these quiet times. It helps to recognize and reaffirm the ongoing nature of Love. This helps ease and then remove any sense of pain or separation. It awakens new gratitude for Life and reminds that however deep the struggle, however glorious the victory, God's "angel-throng of thoughts" are always present to comfort, guard and guide.
Mary Baker Eddy's poem "Christ, My Refuge" is like a blueprint for a soulful prayer of peace, satisfaction and progress.
O'er waiting harpstrings of the mind there sweeps a strain, low, sad, and sweet,
whose measures
bind the power of pain,
and wake a white-winged angel throng of thoughts, illumed by faith, and breathed in raptured song, with love perfumed.
Then His unveiled, sweet mercies show Life's burdens light. I kiss the cross, and wake to know a world more bright.
And o'er earth's troubled, angry sea I see Christ walk, and come to me, and tenderly, divinely talk.
Thus Truth engrounds me on the rock, upon Life's shore, 'gainst which the winds and waves can shock, oh, nevermore!
From tired joy and grief afar, and nearer Thee, — Father, where Thine own children are, I love to be.
My prayer, some daily good to do to Thine, for Thee; an offering pure of Love, whereto God leadeth me.
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
In most major events, we say good bye and say hello almost in the same breath. Parting may be such sweet sorrow, but in that parting, there is a ripening of the human spirit.
When facing a major change in my life or my family's life, I have learned the wisdom of giving myself some quiet space to say goodbye. It gives me time to reflect and consider lessons learned. It gives me time to feel the gratitude for the experiences and people that make up my life experience.
"Low, sad and sweet" sums up the tone of these quiet times. It helps to recognize and reaffirm the ongoing nature of Love. This helps ease and then remove any sense of pain or separation. It awakens new gratitude for Life and reminds that however deep the struggle, however glorious the victory, God's "angel-throng of thoughts" are always present to comfort, guard and guide.
Mary Baker Eddy's poem "Christ, My Refuge" is like a blueprint for a soulful prayer of peace, satisfaction and progress.
O'er waiting harpstrings of the mind there sweeps a strain, low, sad, and sweet,
whose measures
bind the power of pain,
and wake a white-winged angel throng of thoughts, illumed by faith, and breathed in raptured song, with love perfumed.
Then His unveiled, sweet mercies show Life's burdens light. I kiss the cross, and wake to know a world more bright.
And o'er earth's troubled, angry sea I see Christ walk, and come to me, and tenderly, divinely talk.
Thus Truth engrounds me on the rock, upon Life's shore, 'gainst which the winds and waves can shock, oh, nevermore!
From tired joy and grief afar, and nearer Thee, — Father, where Thine own children are, I love to be.
My prayer, some daily good to do to Thine, for Thee; an offering pure of Love, whereto God leadeth me.
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
a story about a healing
Spiritual resource to share: humility
As I approached this situation prayerfully, I asked myself how much did I really know about God? I challenged myself to dig in deeper.
The more I understood God's supremacy, the more in awe I felt - similar to my time skiing on a mountain, when I took a tumble in the knee deep powder. The day was beautiful, my fall was cushioned ever so gently and the sky a wide expanse of blue. "We are loved more grandly than this." I thought.
The more I understood of God's authority, the more strength I felt - similar to the strength I feel when defending an injustice or the protection I see in the wild when mothers defend their young.
The more I understood about God's love, the more calm I felt - similar to the time I saw the Northern lights for the first time with my mom, dad and brothers. And the wonder and beauty of it seemed to include the whole earth.
As I was painfully driving up to meet with others for an all day meeting, I struggled with the idea that I might not make it through the day. At that point, I totally turned to God. "God, I cannot do this without you." It was a letting go, a total surrender. All of what I understand about God helped me to yield to a life force that is authoritatively loving and supremely good. I could not "make" this healing happen, but I could acknowledge that God and God's power is made known in our present experience, here and now.
When I got to the meeting place, my back was much improved. When the meeting started, I forgot about my back. By the time the shortened meeting was over three hours later, I was totally free.
One idea that has been so helpful over and over again is that prayer-based healing is not about human accomplishment, but about divine acknowledgement.
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
As I approached this situation prayerfully, I asked myself how much did I really know about God? I challenged myself to dig in deeper.
The more I understood God's supremacy, the more in awe I felt - similar to my time skiing on a mountain, when I took a tumble in the knee deep powder. The day was beautiful, my fall was cushioned ever so gently and the sky a wide expanse of blue. "We are loved more grandly than this." I thought.
The more I understood of God's authority, the more strength I felt - similar to the strength I feel when defending an injustice or the protection I see in the wild when mothers defend their young.
The more I understood about God's love, the more calm I felt - similar to the time I saw the Northern lights for the first time with my mom, dad and brothers. And the wonder and beauty of it seemed to include the whole earth.
As I was painfully driving up to meet with others for an all day meeting, I struggled with the idea that I might not make it through the day. At that point, I totally turned to God. "God, I cannot do this without you." It was a letting go, a total surrender. All of what I understand about God helped me to yield to a life force that is authoritatively loving and supremely good. I could not "make" this healing happen, but I could acknowledge that God and God's power is made known in our present experience, here and now.
When I got to the meeting place, my back was much improved. When the meeting started, I forgot about my back. By the time the shortened meeting was over three hours later, I was totally free.
One idea that has been so helpful over and over again is that prayer-based healing is not about human accomplishment, but about divine acknowledgement.
To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.
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